


Seagreen

by Azzandra



Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, World of Warcraft
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen, Kul Tiras, Thrall raised by tidesages AU, admittedly this is a weird one, and his canon childhood was way depressing so this is also kinda fix-it fic, but the weirdness is the point
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-07-10
Packaged: 2020-01-01 04:28:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 19,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18328625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Azzandra/pseuds/Azzandra
Summary: Someone other than Aedelas Blackmoore finds Thrall as a baby. He ends up being raised by tidesages. That's it, that's the AU.





	1. Time and Tide

Loathe to leave Kul Tiras as any tidesage, Eyla Wavebound yet found herself aboard a ship skimming along the shore of the Eastern Kingdoms, and wondering how and why she was even there.

Well, the how was simple enough. She'd walked over to the docks in the grips of her terrible premonition, and requested to board the first ship that she knew was headed in the right direction. The 'why' was the more complicated part, and it slipped through her fingers like sand with every moment. In her mind, it was not the sand of Kul Tiras' beaches. It was not the fine silt that rose up around her feet when she stepped into the sea. It was finer sand, gleaming like gold, soft as satin. Desert sand, though she had never seen a desert. Hourglass sand. Meant to slip away like water. Sands of time.

Eyla's thoughts hitched, and she couldn't remember what she'd been thinking of a moment before. She knew thinking on it too hard would only make it slip away again, so she looked out to the sea again, and its familiar ebb and flows. The vision was gone, and would return, as inevitable as the come and go of the tides. She did not know what she had come out to seek, but she would seek it nonetheless.

As she stared off towards the horizon, however, Eyla's eyes caught on the jagged outcropping of land, and the vision bubbled up again, like certainty from the depths.

 

* * *

 

The day was bright and clear-skied, but circumstances conspired to send a chill through the captain of the Swift Fortune anyway. As he had no recourse for doing anything about it, he kept silent, and anxiously rubbed fingers against his receding hairline, taking note of how over the past few years, he had to push his hat further back every time to find hair. He sighed, and let his hand drop, shaking his head.

There was nothing to worry about, if he had to be rational about it. Even with the war against the orcs raging on, the orcs' seafaring skills had proved less than adequate. And the ship had a tidesage on board, to put wind in their sails, and even warn them away from danger. This had been one of the fastest runs Captain Evans had had in his thirty-odd years at sea.

It was just that, well... they had a tidesage on board. And that was irregular, to say the least, for the Swift Fortune, which was a merchant vessel, and not one of the larger ones which had been folded into the war effort to ferry supplies. Like any good sailor, he had a fair dose of respect for tidesages, and had relied on their wisdom often. But they had always been a fixture of the shores for him, and having one always present on his deck was beginning to grind on his nerves. The crew either picked up on this mood, or were plenty disquieted themselves, because they threw their own furtive glances to the tidesage. Wondering why she was there, most like.

Captain Evans was beginning to wonder himself. He was content enough to let her be. 

But then she pointed to the shoreline.

"There," she said, not seeming to address anyone in particular, but speaking it out loud with surety that it would be heard, "that is where I must go."

Captain Evans scratched his head, and popped open his spyglass to look towards the shore, thinking of how he might dissuade the tidesage from whatever mad errand she planned, but he knew right away that was not his point to make. They were ahead of schedule, and annoying a tidesage had never struck him as that bright of an idea.

 

* * *

 

The day was cold, but bright. The sun shone golden, but gave no heat. In the back of Eyla's mind, there was the hiss of sand through an hourglass, running out. The sea was at her back, roiling voices in her head; a forest was ahead, filled with the whispers of wind through the leaves.

Unsure of where she was going, but intent on being there on time, Eyla walked on, and kept walking, until she heard the squalling babe.

The forest echoed strangely, so that she was first confused by the sound, and sooner expected it to be the wail of some animal. If it had been some beast, she would not be defenseless, and so she did not particularly worry on that account. But she did not think it was something of the forest. She unhooked her abyssal beacon from her belt, brandishing it so that it may lead the way. Its light crawled across the speckled shadows of the forest, and licked a winding, luminous path forward.

The air felt portentous; she walked towards the sound, following her beacon's light, knowing it was the path the Tidemother ordained for her.

It was a child, was it not? Who would leave a babe in the woods, she asked herself, and the answer came as she emerged into the clearing, and took in the scene of dead orc bodies littered across the ground.

The scene brought up more questions than answers, but like anyone who scrutinized the abyssal depths, Eyla was comfortable with mysteries. She surveyed the clearing, coming to the conclusion that the orcs had fought each other--never mind for what reason, as Eyla was certain orcs were no more above murdering each other than humans were--and then she raised the hems of her robes as she picked her way through the blood and gore.

The babe was orcish, and its wailing was a deeper sound than human infants would have produced. It was tucked against the side of one more orc body, the shape female, though a gashing wound down her back had nearly rent her in half.

Unable to answer the question of what the orcs had been doing here, Eyla set on questioning what business she herself had. Was this where her visions had been leading her? The orc babe would have surely died or been eaten by animals, but what difference would that make, in the grander scheme of things? What great ripples could this one small life possibly make?

Grappling with questions came easier to Eyla than handling babies, which she had not done unless for reasons of healing, and always with the parents nearby for the babe to be handed back as soon as possible. She realized she was stalling.

She leaned down, reached for the babe. It had kicked off the blue swaddling cloth, and was likely cold, so Eyla pulled the cloth over the tiny orc, and its cries momentarily stopped, and hitched to wet whimpers as it opened its eyes and looked up.

The babe had clear blue eyes, bright and shiny as it looked up with curiosity. It burbled at Eyla.

Despite herself, Eyla was endeared, the way she would be by a tiny pup, or an ugly little baby bird. It was only for a moment, however, because in the next, the orcish female took in a sudden, pained gasp, and moved with unexpected swiftness to grab Eyla's wrist.

Eyla emitted a high-pitched shriek of panic, which echoed through the woods around her with mocking reverb. The female orc released Eyla's wrist, though that was probably because she was too near death to do much else, and not because she'd been impressed by Eyla's heroic scream of fear. The orc lapsed into weak coughs.

'I'm never having a vision ever again,' Eyla thought to herself furiously, though she knew that was more the Tidemother's decision than her own. She reached to her belt--laden with pouches and bottles--and unclipped a small flask of rejuvenating sea water. It would do little more than delay the inevitable at this point, but at least falling back on her healer's instincts gave her something to do.

She splashed the female orc with it. The horrendous wound on her back did not close, though the water pooled into it and sank deep, trying to heal her from the inside. It disappeared so quickly, that Eyla knew there was too much to her for the orc to survive. Still, Eyla called on magic, and weaved a healing spell into the sea water. The orc's body took to the magic hungrily, but it was too broken to be much improved by it.

Yet it strengthened the orc, and she began moving, pushing herself from lying face-down to lying on her side, facing her infant. Eyla noticed then that the wound on the orc's back was not the only one she had, only the deepest. Had someone attacked her from behind? Had she been cradling the child, and turned around to take a wound on the back so the babe would not be hit?

The orc began talking slowly, in their own rough language. 

Eyla reached for another bottle on her belt. This one was not water, but for tidesages, the wind was as familiar as the sea. When she uncapped the bottle, the essence of air inside escaped, and released all the languages it had gathered on the winds. For a time, there would be understanding.

"...my son..." the orc said slowly, her face in agony, "...my son..."

The orc babe, who'd been quiet for a short time, made a sound that foretold another fit of crying. The orc female reached for the infant, her large hand curling around one of the babe's tiny fists.

The female's face twisted into an expression that told of more than just physical pain. Strange, how swallowing one's pride looked the same even on the rough-hewn features of an orc.

"Please," she asked, before her body convulsed in soundless coughs.

Eyla understood what was being asked, as the orc was gripped by maternal desperation, but she still would have quailed at the prospect under different circumstances. More merciful to kill them both quickly, and have a neat end to it all. But Eyla cast her thoughts to the sea which had brought her there in more senses than one, and to the Tidemother's whispers, and understood that she had come too far to refuse now.

"What is your name?" Eyla asked the orc.

"Draka," she answered slowly, carefully, with fragile hope in her eyes.

Eyla nodded and leaned down to gather the orc babe in her arms. She picked him up a bit awkwardly, being larger than a human infant, but she figured the same technique applied as with human babes, and she made sure to support his head. The babe made burbling infant sounds in response, though there was one confused hitch of the breath that indicated he was near another wailing fit.

"And what is your son's name?" Eyla asked next, looking to Draka.

The orc's eyes were already going hazy, her expression slack with the approach of death.

"He was to be named Go'el," she said, all yearning and regret for things that would not come to pass. For a childhood not witnessed. For mother's love denied. For the first time, Eyla felt something other than trepidation during this entire encounter. Perhaps it was pity.

"Go'el," Eyla repeated, and realized Draka had already slipped away. "Go'el," Eyla repeated, looking to the orc babe's face, as if teaching him his name.

Go'el looked up at Eyla for a moment, with those startlingly blue eyes, and then promptly began crying.

Eyla sighed. What a fine mess to get herself into.

 

* * *

 

The sailors reacted with varying levels of bemusement. Captain Evans, looking down to the ground as though beseeching the sea to drown him before he had to actually deal with this, scratched his head for a long time before stepping aside and letting Eyla pass with her squalling infant.

Eyla felt the eyes follow her as she disappeared below deck and found the ship cook.

"I don't suppose you have any milk?" she asked.

The cook, a skinny hunched man with one eye perpetually squinting, gave Eyla quite the withering once-over in response.

"Gotch'erself a pet?" he asked with a slur that Eyla suspected came more from repeated concussions than daydrinking, though in this case she suspected a bit of both.

"Cow milk? Goat milk? Whale milk?" Eyla tried again, rocking Go'el as he continued shrieking.

"Got some grog, that'll put yer pet to sleep," the cook offered.

"Permanently, given the quality of it. I've had your grog. No," Eyla shook her head.

The cook chortled wetly, in a way that made Eyla lean more towards him being drunk. But he turned around at leisure, and took out a bottle, opening by flicking the cork out with a thumb. He proffered the bottle to Eyla, who took it, but sniffed the contents suspiciously.

"It's goat's milk, yeah," the cook groused.

"Ah." She looked uncertainly down to Go'el. "Do I... just...?"

"Should probably mix it with blood or summat," the cook remarked. 

He watched Eyla very carefully tip the bottle over the infant's mouth, a few drops splattering against his lips and dripping down his chin instead of into his mouth.

"'Course, it might starve 'fore you choke up the courage to feed the blasted thing," the cook continued.

Eyla was flustered, and rocked Go'el, shushing him. He proved heavy to hold with only one arm, though, and she wasn't sure how to tip the bottle so as not to spill it all over him. It did not have a nipple, as such.

"'Ere, you're useless," the cook said bluntly, and took the bottle back. He produced from one of his cabinets a clean, white linen, perhaps a bandage of sort. He folded it in quarters and wrapped it around the mouth of the bottle, tying it in place with string. He was creating a rudimentary bottle for nursing, and Eyla was relieved at least someone here seemed to know what they were doing.

"We should probably heat up the milk, as well," she suggested.

The cook snorted, and gave Eyla a forbidding look.

"Ain't running a fancy restaurant here," he said, and gestured for her to sit down on one of the long benches in the galley.

Eyla did so, and sitting down she could place the baby down in her lap, his little feet against her abdomen, and his head cradled against her knees. He proved easier to feed this way, and when she put the bottle to his mouth and allowed the milk to drip out, he latched onto it, and stopped crying.

She was overwhelmingly relieved by this, and even felt a small measure of triumph that she knew would evaporate the next time Go'el did something inexplicably baby-ish that she would not know how to handle. She needed to find someone who knew children.

The cook wandered over as the child nursed, his gnarled face screwed in something like curiosity.

"Do you have any little ones?" Eyla asked, deciding to trade on the cook's improving mood. It appeared as though he was far more endeared by the infant once it was not crying.

"Oh, aye, three o' the little demonspawn back home," the cook nodded. "We take care of them in six month jags, the wife and I. Six months she goes to sea, six months I go. Meanwhile the other gets stuck watching the damn hellions." He gave Eyla a shrewd look. "You don't know what'cher in for, I can see."

Eyla stiffened, indignant.

"I don't really think--"

"Yer keeping it?" the cook interrupted.

Eyla looked down at the child--at Go'el--who'd gotten his fill and pushed the bottle away with a little green fist. He looked up at her with those blue eyes again, and hiccuped a little.

"I'm afraid I am," she said.

"Don't know what'cher getting into," the cook repeated, this time with malicious glee.

 

* * *

 

Eyla Wavebound had always found a dose of forbearance granted to her, whenever she wandered back to Stormsong Monastery after some tide-ordained jaunt. She listened to deeper voices than most, and was, accordingly, allowed a greater margin for eccentricity.

But Eyla rather thought everyone had decided she'd finally cracked when she showed up with an orc babe in her arms. 

Her sister Yvia, who perhaps was the first to hear whispers of Eyla's return from the tides, was waiting on the docks as Eyla debarked the Swift Fortune. 

Yvia, who'd always been more inclined to the precision of arcane works than the more--as she called it--wishy-washy pursuits of a spiritualist, took one look at Eyla, one at the orc, and then set her face into a look of such mighty disapproval, that one might have thought Eyla was a child bringing home a shark pup in a bowl and asking to keep it as a pet.

Ah, but an orc was probably much worse of a thing to bring home. Still, Eyla cradled Go'el closer, and set her own face in a look of such implacability that even the tides might be turned.

Yvia sighed, and reached out to tug a corner of the swaddling cloth over Go'el's face.

"Come to the Monastery," she said. "This must be brought to Lord Stormsong."

Eyla nodded, because though she was well prepared to stare down her sister, Lord Stormsong had more of a standing to forbid her from this course of action, and, for that matter, more of a right to question it, even if she thought he might be persuadable.

"His name is Go'el," Eyla said, feeling she ought to at least make introductions.

Yvia looked phenomenally unhappy about knowing this.


	2. Safe Harbor

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey, thanks to everyone who's willing to see where this AU is headed! I'm not completely sure myself, but I hope we're going to have fun discovering together.

"Eyla, are you my mother?" Go'el asked once.

Eyla's mouth fell open in surprise, before she gathered herself again, and turned in her seat. Whenever she was at her desk, Go'el knew she was working. But he had spotted he idly drawing tentacles on the edges of a page, and he knew that meant she was not really working, because Yvia had once remarked on the habit, with an air of disappointment that she always had when Eyla did something not to her liking.

Eyla did not answer right away, instead drying her quill and placing it back in its stand. 

"I'm not your mother," she said.

"Oh."

"Are you disappointed?" she asked, face pinched in concern.

"No, I figured. Because you're not green," he said. 

This made her laugh unexpectedly, and though he did not quite understand why, it pleased him that he'd provoked this reaction, and he smiled crookedly at her. 

But Eyla lapsed into thoughtful silence afterwards, and rising from her seat, she shuffled towards the trunk at the foot of her bed, and flipped it open. That was where she kept her personal items--clothing, spare robes, various odds and ends, a few journals with illegible handwriting and fantastical drawings. She took out each item in turn, until she reached a small, flat box at the bottom, completely nondescript and unadorned.

She took out the box and put it on the bed, flipping it open. Go'el peered curiously at its contents, which seemed nothing more than a sky-blue length of cloth. When Eyla took out the material, however, she turned it over to show the wolf head emblazoned on it.

"Your mother's name was Draka," Eyla said. "This was the blanket you were wrapped in, when I found you. She died, but she wanted you to live."

Go'el, who had not given any thought until then to how he'd gotten to the Monastery, reached out with shaky hands for the swaddling cloth, and ran reverent fingers over the material.

"Draka," he repeated, amazed at the notion that he hadn't simply been brought in by the tides one day, and trying to wrap his head around the notion of a mother who was not Eyla.

 

* * *

 

For the earliest part of Go'el's life, his entire world was nothing but Stormsong Monastery. By the time he was old enough to question why that would be so--especially since there were no other children there--he was also old enough to notice that his skin was green, and his face not quite human. He could not very well remember when or where he heard the word 'orc' for the first time, save that it had always followed him in whispers from the tidesages who liked him least and, more often than not, from initiates first arrived to the monastery.

He did remember when he first had a meaning ascribed to the word, and returned to Eyla's room to ask her about it.

Eyla, squinting against the light of her lamp, tapping her ink-stained lip with a finger, was so deep in her thoughts, that it took her a moment to gather her wits, and then she stiffened in her seat, turning to look at Go'el.

"Who told you that?" she asked, looking alarmed.

"It's true orcs killed Derek Proudmoore?" Go'el insisted.

"Well--it was war," Eyla said, looking visibly uncomfortable now. "Derek Proudmoore wasn't the only one they killed, and it didn't do much good in the end, considering they lost."

"But... Derek Proudmoore was supposed to be the next Lord-Admiral," Go'el said, because this was his only touchstone to a conflict he poorly understood, and knew only filtered through Kul Tiran interests.

"The sea takes anyone it wills," Eyla said dryly. "And you were a toddler when it happened, so I'd hardly think you were responsible."

It proved a poor balm for the itching wound Go'el had found in the subject. Eyla might not think he was responsible, but Go'el understood for the first time, as a child of six, that others would think differently.

"Why was there a war?" he asked hesitantly.

Eyla's expression grew vague as she thought on the question for a few moments, and then she shook her head.

"I'll tell you when you're older," she said, and turned back to the map she was annotating.

"But Eyla--"

"Hush, Go'el," she said, not unkindly. "I have to research it first."

Go'el felt bubbling impatience, because he was certain Eyla could simply tell him and she was only delaying. But part of him did not want to know, because an incipient sense of guilt had already nestled in his chest, fostered by every harsh word and glare he'd ever gotten. His thoughts of sneaking down to the archives and learning for himself never quite took hold as more than passing whim. He wanted Eyla to be the one to tell him.

He stomped off to his side of the room, past the heavy green drape that marked his space, and he reached under his bed, where he kept his old swaddling cloth. This scrap of cloth that he puzzled over on days when he pondered on his origins--the sky-blue material, the wolf on it--gained new mysteries to him on that day. A new dimension. And yet too young to know the word context, he nonetheless began to ponder on the notion.

He did not yet understand everything, but he at least now possessed a lens through which to understand the words and attitudes of the adults around him.

 

* * *

 

Though she was not his mother, Eyla was his first tutor. Inscribed in Go'el's memories would be the evenings when Eyla had him read aloud by the light of the lamp. Or, once she began teaching him to write, the feel of her larger hand guiding his own, as he clenched the quill and she showed him the shape of letters and runes. The tactile memory of the first maps she showed him, unfurled on her desk, with wending lines to show the currents around Kul Tiras, and bold black strokes to mark the geography.

When Eyla was not available to badger with questions, there was everyone else. Through trial and error, Go'el had learned which of the tidesages were more likely to indulge his curiosity.

He learned sea shanties from the cooks, while they gutted fish for stew. He learned many unusual prayers to the Tidemother from Sister Albertine, who sat for hours in the grass and knitted scarves and thick socks for her grandchildren. He eavesdropped on the Initiates, who were often newly-arrived at the Monastery, and had not yet learned the odd corners where their voices were amplified, or the blindspots where someone might sit and listen. The gossip he acquired thusly he traded to Brother Gordon for stories of sea monsters, and then Go'el sneaked to the Archives, where he might convince Sister Hesther to look up illustrations of these monsters, and if she was not busy, she would show him the frightening pictures, because she liked stories of monsters even more than Go'el did.

On market days--which was to say days when the Tradewinds Market was even busier than usual, which was usually at holidays or when the great Ashvane merchant ships brought in the last hauls for the year--the Monastery would be especially busy. More than just sailors came in: visitors from afar who had heard of the tidesages and wished to employ their services, or trade on magical knowledge and relics; ship captains from the Eastern Kingdoms, who did not have tidesages of their own, and wanted to employ them on important trips; petitioners who wanted some help or favor; scholars who wanted to consult the extensive archives.

Go'el would see all manner of folks, though he was often chided to keep out of sight. He would get shocked looks from outsiders, evidently surprised to see an orc there, though just as evidently unsure how to react to the notion that he was a an orc child, at that.

The truth was that Go'el never truly believed anything bad would happen to him, so he did not take the tidesages' warning to stay away from strangers too seriously. 

He was not prepared for this lax attitude to come back and bite him, but one day, as Go'el incautiously walked past where a tidesage was talking with a petitioner, Go'el felt himself being grabbed by the back of his shirt and bodily lifted into the air before he could even react.

"Heard about your orc pup!" the large man who grabbed Go'el said. "Thought it was some daft rumor!"

Go'el kicked his feet, finding no purchase, and his hands went to clench into the collar of his own shirt, trying to stop himself from choking.

"Put him down right now!" the tidesage snapped.

"I ain't hurtin' him," the stranger grunted, and turned Go'el around to get a better look at him as he dangled in the air. "Could get good money for him, you know."

The man was built like an ox, as sturdy a back as any dock-worker, thought his clothes were fine, and his coat had the Ashvane coat of arms embroidered on the chest. Perhaps he was here to negotiate a contract for additional tidesages on some valuable trade run--something they often did. Go'el, at that moment, cared for nothing but to be put down again.

"I said let him go, before I separate him from you at your elbow," the tidesage growled.

Just as abruptly as he was hauled off the ground, Go'el was dropped again. Tears had gathered at the corners of his eyes, mostly from lack of air, but Go'el did not cry. He forced himself not to cry. He blinked away the tears to look up to the tidesage who'd defended him, and was surprised to see Brother Gehrig, his hand on the pommel of his kris as he half-pulled it from the sheath at his back.

After giving Go'el a once-over, Brother Gehrig sheathed the kris back all the way--though very slowly, and with a pointed glare to the Ashvane representative.

"No need to get testy, now," the Ashvane man grinned nastily, holding his hands up in surrender.

Brother Gehrig's eyes did not leave the large man, and his hand did not--quite--leave the pommel of the kris, but he addressed Go'el as he said,

"Go inside."

Go'el did not wait to be told twice. He scurried to his feet, and ran inside with his heart hammering in his chest, and then did not stop running until he was in the room he shared with Eyla. When Eyla came later, after finishing her tasks for the day, she asked Go'el what was wrong, but he couldn't find the words to explain.

Go'el had always assumed Brother Gehrig hated him, and understanding how that fit with his willingness to defend him was not something Go'el could comprehend yet.

 

* * *

 

After the unfortunate incident, Go'el grew more cautious, but he could never quite suppress his curiosity. And others were not quite as frightening or as eager to manhandle him as that horrid Ashvane company man.

Of all the strange visitors the Monastery got, Go'el found he quite liked the tortollans. They came bearing satchels of wondrous things, and apparently had no notion that Go'el was different from humans, though they apparently did grasp that he was very young.

"You're the littlest tidesage I've ever seen!" Scrollsage Titokka told Go'el the first time they met.

Titokka had put down a square of sailcloth and then begun arranging her wares on it, like she was a vendor at the market. The tidesages were giving the tortollan ambivalent looks. That was not how they usually traded with anyone who came to the Monastery for this purpose, but they were also loathe to correct Titokka's misapprehensions. They hid fond little smiles behind their hands, the way they did sometimes when Go'el did something strange or endearing.

It was that, more than anything, which convinced Go'el that Titokka was safe to approach, and he inched closer until he could see the tortollan's wares. Strange, water-damaged items made their appearance out of Titokka's satchel: a music box, a carved stone statuette, a scepter with feathers and small rodent skulls tied to it, an astrolabe...

"I'm not a tidesage," Go'el had to inform Titokka, who hummed thoughtfully in response.

Then she perked up, as she hit upon a new avenue of conversation.

"Are you on the market for any powerful artifacts?" she asked, gesturing to her wares.

"I don't have anything to trade," he said. "Do you really live under the sea?"

"Do you really live on land?" Titokka retorted.

"I can't leave," Go'el said.

Titokka shook her head regretfully at the notion, and then offered to explain what all her strange items were. Eager for any stories of far off places, Go'el sat on the ground, crossing his legs and leaning forward with interest. The tidesages continued to hide smiles behind their hands.

 

* * *

 

Disregarding the fact that tutelage did not fall within Eyla's primary duties at the Monastery, as Go'el grew older and his curiosity more expansive, Eyla also proved too distracted to continue the task of teaching him. She lacked focus, as her sister Yvia liked to constantly upbraid Eyla.

Go'el would have still liked it well enough for Eyla to continue teaching him, save that one day, as he sat on a bench in a shaded alcove of the monastery, reading a book that Eyla had given him, Yvia unexpectedly showed up to sit on the bench across from him. 

There must have been other places to sit. It was yet morning, and all the initiates were at their lessons; Go'el could hear the voices of instructors over the sound of rushing water. The courtyard, with all its benches, was quiet and empty.

Go'el cautiously closed the book and set it down on the bench, next to him; Yvia had never said a harsh word to him, but that was mostly because she did not say anything to him at all. Whenever he was the subject, she addressed Eyla solely, as if he were not even in the room. She fairly radiated disapproval, however, and Go'el knew, on some intuitive level, that even if it was disapproval of Eyla's actions, he was still its root cause.

"What are you reading?" Yvia asked, her voice cold and to the point, but not angry.

"A book Eyla gave me," Go'el said, picking it up to show the title.

Yvia's eyes darted to take in the title, before returning to him.

"And do you understand it?" she asked.

Go'el felt needled by the implication that he wouldn't. It was only a book of old tidesage stories. He knew he was not stupid, so did not rise to the bait.

"Eyla wants me to read the first five stories and explain the morals they're trying to teach," Go'el replied.

Yvia's lips tightened.

"Of course she has you do literary analysis," Yvia sighed, looking very much put-upon. "No, we must see that you acquire more practical skills than that."

Go'el was taken aback by the declaration, especially given Yvia's complete lack of interest in him up until that point. But his hunger for further education overrode any misgivings he'd had about Yvia, and he found himself pathetically glad as she wrangled tutors for him over the next week, and opened an entire new trove of knowledge to him.

 

* * *

 

When Go'el had time to sit and think, he would often go to secluded spots up on the Monastery walls, and look out towards Boralus. The small islet that the Moanstery occupied was only separated by a short strip of water--narrow enough to swim across, if the tidesages didn't insist everyone come by boat. Narrow enough that someone in the Tradewinds Market could snipe a small orc child sitting on the shore of the islet, though Go'el did not understand or think of this when he was first given this interdiction.

Still, if he did not understand it, he still kept his distance, especially after the more shocking incidents he'd had with visitors to the Monastery. He could still remember being picked up by the back of his shirt and dangled like bait on a line.

But time to sit and think became scarce for Go'el, once he was running between cartography and geography lessons with Sister Lilyana in the morning, zoology with Brother Langdon at noon, tidesage lore with Brother Pike in the afternoon, medicinal alchemy with Sister Elspeth right before dinner, and all the reading he had to do independently after dinner.

He got to see Eyla only in the evenings and morning, and in the mornings only because they rose at the same time, before dawn--Eyla so she could row out and read the tides before sunrise, and Go'el because he had chores in the kitchens. He chopped vegetables and shucked clams while stifling yawns and trying not to rub his eyes, but having not seen Yvia since she arranged tutors for him, he decided this meant she was lurking somewhere and expecting him to crumble under this demanding schedule, and he stubbornly decided not to give her the satisfaction.

But as the months slipped by--day after day passing so quickly they melted together--Go'el found that his days became comfortable again. His head did not feel heavy for all the knowledge he now accumulated, and his tutors seemed satisfied, if nothing else, with his lessons.

Not that they told him this, of course. He could guess, by the small smile Brother Pike gave him, or by the wink and cackle Sister Elspeth gave him sometimes. 

Sister Lilyana was far more stoic, though she was the youngest of his tutors, but even she tended to reward Go'el's diligence at his studies with tidbits and interesting stories that apparently had no relation to the established lesson plan. At the end of their tutoring sessions, she would sometimes pick a map at random from her rack, and unfurl it for him on the table, introducing him to new places.

He was most impressed with the biggest map in her collection, of Azeroth in its entirety. It was the first time he'd heard about Kalimdor, or learned there was a continent to the west.

"Oh, yes, we know of it, though there has been little interest in exploring it, outside certain... eccentric circles," Sister Lilyana said. "Kul Tiran sailors have known of it for centuries, of course. The Eastern Kingdoms periodically rediscover it, and then write it off again."

"Why? Doesn't anyone want to explore Kalimdor? It's a whole new continent," Go'el pointed out.

"It's an ill-advised endeavor," she said. "Expeditions to that place tend not to come back, and even if they did, it would be a poor place to establish a colony, or depend on for trade." She gestured the great ocean between the continents, to the islands and the spiraling whorl in the center. "The Maelstrom is a constant hazard, and even then, there's the Zandalari to consider. Establishing shipping lanes that hem so closely to their waters is an enormous risk that comes with uncertain rewards. Perhaps there is something valuable enough in Kalimdor to justify the risk, but the initial investment necessary to discover any such resource is not quite worth it at this time."

Sister Lilyana tended to speak like that about many things; she came from a mercantile family, as Go'el learned years later, and had learned from an early age to analyze anything through this lens.

But in the moment, all Go'el could wonder was if exploration couldn't be its own reward. It was something he would understand when he was older, maybe. For now, he was content to relegate Kalimdor as some place to visit in his imagination, and try his best to excel at his studies.

His tutors were pleased enough with him, he hoped. But if they told anyone of his progress, it was apparently not Yvia, but Eyla.

"You're so bright, Go'el," Eyla said one evening, ruffling his hair before falling heavily into her chair.

"Thank you," Go'el said, raising his head from the book he was reading. The compliment had come with no preamble, and following no previous thread of conversation. He seized on the opportunity to ask his own question, however. "Does this mean I can become a tidesage?"

Eyla, slumped in her seat and already going half-lidded, roused suddenly at the question.

"A tidesage?" she repeated, surprised by the notion.

Go'el didn't know why it should be a surprise. If not to become a tidesage, why teach him anything at all? Why keep him locked up in the Monastery?

But Eyla stared off into the distance for a few moments more, before nodding to herself. Go'el never knew if this meant she was asking the sea. Could she hear the Tidemother all the way indoors? It seemed unlikely.

"We'll see," Eyla said.

 

* * *

 

Go'el did not expect much to come of the conversation so soon, but two days later, as they woke before dawn, Eyla told him he would not be going about his chores in the kitchen. Instead, she told him he would be coming with her for the day.

Being taken along was novel for Go'el, especially since that meant leaving the small island that proscribed his entire life until then. They did not go towards the busy city that he could see from the Monastery walls, but instead took a small boat and rowed off into the other direction, to one of the empty beaches south-east of Boralus.

The dawn was gray and cold when they set out. Go'el had been given a set of initiate's robes to bundle into, and he pulled the hood low on his face, feeling this was an illicit outing, even though Eyla showed no concern about them being stopped at any point. The frigid Kul Tiran morning cut to the bone, but Eyla did not seem to mind, so Go'el suppressed a shiver as well.

The beach was quiet, and fog still hung heavy in the air.

"Keep an eye out," Eyla advised. "Naga and murlocs roam these places."

Go'el was only mildly alarmed at the notion, knowing these creatures only as abstract dangers. There was nobody in Boralus who wasn't armed in some way, the tidesages included, and adding to the fact that he had never been allowed to wander the shores unwatched, it was never a concern he had had to face.

But with Eyla here, he could not even muster up concern. She was powerful, and in a sheath at her belt she had her kris. He felt well-defended, though he himself was defenseless.

Eyla led the boat ashore, to a beach devoid of either naga or murlocs; at most a few hermit crabs scuttled about. Though he was yet only up to Eyla's chest in height, he hopped out and helped her drag the boat ashore, until she was satisfied the waves would not steal it away. 

Go'el looked up and down the beach in wonder. 

"I'm not sure I'm the best to teach you how to hear the voices of the sea," Eyla said, staring off into the distance. "I can't remember a time before I could hear them. Perhaps Yvia would be better to tell you how the knack goes. She's always been the pragmatist." 

Eyla lapsed into silence for a moment, thinking. Go'el did not interrupt, knowing that it often took her a minute to put her thoughts to words.

"Yvia believes," Eyla said slowly, almost to herself, "that being a tidesage should be reading currents like leylines, and solving mysteries like equations. Putting everything head to head until it is a coherent whole, and when everything is understood clearly, the power is unlocked. I think hearing the Tidemother's voice is... more like a dream we are headed towards."

Eyla's expression softened as she considered the soft lap of waves against the shore.

"The mysteries are the point," she said softly. "And not every voice you hear means you well. It is better to know when you are not meant to know something."

She gave Go'el a sidelong look.

"You don't listen with your ears," she said. "You listen with a part of you that--" She paused, again searching for words. "You listen for the part of you that _yearns_. And the sea is good for that, inspiring yearning."

Go'el did not completely understand, but he wished to try anyway, so he sat down in the sand, looking out to the sea. Eyla sat down next to him--lowering herself slowly, but then gracelessly falling the last few inches, with an audible 'oof'. She looked out towards the sea, as he did. He did not know if she was listening, as her face did not reveal anything but a remote thoughtfulness. But perhaps that was what she always looked like when she was listening.

He closed his eyes, thinking perhaps this would help him focus on what he was meant to hear, but as the minutes ticked by and nothing happened, he began reassessing the strategy.

What kind of yearning did he need to hear the voices under the sea? Was wanting to not enough? He frowned, casting his mind back to lessons he had overheard at the Monastery, to the way the tidesages spoke of the sea, as though that would lend him a clue.

His hands curled into the sand, squeezing into fists as though he could grab onto what was eluding him. The crash of waves was regular, and predictable, like the ocean's heartbeat. Perhaps if he was in the water it would be different, but he was on solid ground, for a given value of solid. His mind dipped down, slipping away from the water and wandering into the dark, cool steadiness of the ground; the rocks that could wreck ships; the valleys that gave forth harvests; the deep places only the roots of the oldest trees reached, like anchors gripping everything in place against the battering of an ocean all around. 

He startled out of these thoughts as he realized his thoughts had wandered far off from the sea.

Eyla was watching him, her dark green gaze coming from far-away.

"Perhaps," she said, "we should focus on what calls to you, as well."


	3. The Old Man of the Sea

"I am taking you to see Old Man Stormsong," Eyla told him one evening. "Pack lightly, we leave tomorrow."

Go'el blinked in response, taken aback by this sudden announcement. So taken he was by the notion of leaving the Monastery, and going elsewhere, and the questions of what one packed for travel, that it took him several minutes to even fully grasp who he was being taken to see, and what an honor that was.

He froze, kneeling on the ground in front of his open trunk, paralyzed by indecision as he looked at his shirts and britches folded in neat piles. Ought he have some better clothes to wear for this visit? Something-- He wasn't sure what, but better. Probably embroidered and with a lot of dainty buttons. Would he be delivering insult by arriving only in his least drab clothing, when all his wardrobe was hand-downs Eyla had acquired for him?

Go'el rose and walked over to Eyla, where she was already stuffing items in a small satchel.

"Eyla," Go'el spoke hesitantly, "do I... do I need to wear something special for the meeting?"

"Oh, he doesn't stand on ceremony, Go'el," Eyla said, unconcerned. She began checking the pouches on her belt, making sure she had all the reagents and potions she required. When Go'el continued to hover nearby, she turned her attention to him, and noticed his concern. "This is nothing to worry about," she assured. "Here, why don't I help you pack?"

Go'el nodded, relieved, and together they went to his trunk, and picked out a change of clean, presentable clothing: a pair of striped trousers, a vest with little anchor-shaped tabs instead of buttons--a terrible pain to close up the whole row of them, so Go'el rarely wore it--and finally, a shirt he hadn't quite grown into yet. But because he hadn't worn it yet, it was also still a pristine white, and tucked into his trousers and under his vest, it would not be obvious the garment was just a little too large on him.

Eyla then produced a tin of a black cream from somewhere in the bottom of a trunk, and instructed Go'el it was to polish his boots with.

Go'el gave the cream a cautious sniff, and concluded it was probably how all the primped and proper officers and noblemen who visited the Monastery always had boots of such a pitch black shine. The tin was entirely full, practically untouched; Eyla's boots were encrusted with mud and so scuffed that the leather had long since turned soft and pliant.

 

* * *

 

Traveling to the Shrine of the Storm meant leaving the Monastery, and Go'el could not be more excited at the notion.

Yet all he could feel, as Eyla gestured for him to get onto the boat, was a sense of trepidation. Going to an empty beach was one thing. Traversing Boralus and going to the docks-- cutting through the crowded city--

Eyla hopped onto the boat, and turned to offer Go'el a hand, and he could do nothing but shed his apprehensions and follow.

They were not the only ones on the boat this time. Several other tidesages were going to the Shrine, and two tideguards were at the oars. Go'el ended up sitting between Eyla and Sister Harrow. It did not give him much of a view of his surroundings, but it did not give anyone around them much of a view of him either, and probably that was the point.

But he still took in the sounds and sights of the city passing by, leaning to look to the entire world across the canal. Boralus was loud and busy, a clash of colors and smells, but this time Go'el could see it up close, not just as a distant blur of writhing shapes. Off towards Unity Square, Go'el could see the glint of helmets or blades where the harbor guards were posted. They were forbidding figures, in their uniforms displaying the Proudmoore crest. The highest tower of Proudmoore Keep jutted over the skyline as ever, closer and larger than Go'el had ever seen it.

On the other shore, Mariner's Row provided a distinctly fishy smell, and in contrast to the clean uniforms and fine clothing of the strollers in the Square, a far rowdier crowd inhabited that district. But this was as close as Go'el had gotten to either of the neighborhoods, and they passed by too quickly for him to determine anything more about those places than what he could see from the walls of Stormsong Monastery through a spyglass.

They arrived to the docks eventually, and to the moored ship waiting for them. She was called Stormdodger, and Eyla told Go'el it was an Outrigger-hired ship which had agreed to take a detour and drop off the tidesages at the Shrine, in exchange for blessings that would keep the Outriggers safe on their next monster hunt.

"What are they hunting?" Go'el asked, now feeling disappointed that he would not get to see the monster hunt.

"I don't know if they're hunting anything in particular," Eyla said, and looked over her shoulder to the sea; consulting the tides, perhaps. "The naga have gotten fairly brazen lately, but really, there's always some beastie or other needing to be skewered."

Once they were on board, Eyla instructed Go'el not to get in the way, but she did not precisely make interdictions, either, so Go'el took this as permission to wander away from her side as she chatted with a sailor.

The deck of the Stormdodger was a rush of activity, as last minute cargo was lowered into the hold. It seemed there would be no more passengers other than the tidesages, but there were more than sailors on board. The deck of the ship boasted several large harpoon guns, and rough-looking individuals bristling with hunting gear and clad in leather armor went about their own tasks, mostly preparing equipment and weapons.

Go'el recognized Outriggers by sight, given how many came to the Monastery for blessings over the years. They had fantastic monster stories, but they rarely lingered to tell any, as they were forever rushing off on some new hunt. 

With the rush of activity, Go'el did not attract much notice as he crept along the deck, making his way through distracted adults. One or two heads turned after him, but Go'el walked confidently ahead, and nobody stopped him. Towards the bow of the ship was the largest harpoon gun yet, mounted on a swivel along with a chair for whoever manned it. 

The range had to be impressive on the thing. The ammo certainly was. A blonde woman, built like a bear and about as tall as one standing upright, was loading the gun with a long, wickedly-hooked harpoon. 

Go'el stopped to stare, as the woman effortlessly loaded the projectile into the gun,but as she finished this task, she finally noticed Go'el as well, and blinked in response.

There was another woman sitting in the gunner's seat, this one smaller and darker, with a long black ponytail hanging down her back, and she turned around to follow her blonde companion's gaze. Unlike the phlegmatic underreaction of the first woman, the brunette flinched and wheeled around in her chair as she saw Go'el.

"What the fu-- hell," the brunette woman said with a hitch, as she realized Go'el was much younger than her usual audience. She needn't have bothered, since Go'el had eavesdropped on enough sailors to know all the words that adults usually refrained from using around him, but he didn't mention this. The brunette turned towards the blonde woman. "Didn't know we had any of those on board."

Go'el felt a flush of angry embarrassment rise up in his chest, hot and freezing at the same time.

But the blonde woman's lip curled at the corner, and she said in a surprisingly soft voice,

"You mean children?"

"Yeah," the brunette said after a long pause, giving a surprised huff of laughter. "Isn't there a height requirement or something?"

"He's with the tidesages, Avery," the blonde woman pointed out softly. "They're not coming on the hunt."

"Oh, that's alright, I guess," the brunette--Avery--acquiesced, but she still gave Go'el an askance look.

The blonde woman, however, perhaps knowing from long acquaintance that any diplomatic overtures would inevitably fall to her, stepped closer to Go'el and offered her hand. It was large and calloused, and small nicks and scars marked the skin all the way up her arms, but when Go'el shook it, it was also warm, and the grip firm and reassuring.

"Kimberley Eastwind," she introduced herself with a bob of the head. Then she tilted her head to the side to point to her companion. "Avery Coombes."

"Go'el," he introduced himself in turn, mirroring the gentle gravity that Kimberley had used. He probably didn't do it very well, because both Avery and Kimberley grinned in response, sharing a look.

But their banter had cut the sting out of Avery's reaction to him a bit, and the fact that they didn't send him off had given him heart.

"Do you kill monsters with that?" he asked, pointing to the gun.

"Ah, ol' Kraken-Whacker," Avery said, patting the targeting panel with a pleased smile. "You bet we do."

"You bet we don't call it that," Kimberley added in the driest voice she'd used yet.

"We had a vote," Avery said, her smile remaining fixed.

"You got us all drunk first," Kimberley continued.

This was all getting away from the subject that interested Go'el, however. He walked closer to the gun, peering up at it.

"Did you kill _a lot_ of monsters with it?" he asked.

"It's not really meant to kill a lot of things," Avery said, "just exceptionally large ones."

She hopped out of the gunner's seat, and patted the hard wooden surface, gesturing for Go'el to hop on.

"Can I?" he asked breathlessly, and Avery grinned from ear to ear in response.

"Sure, long as you don't push any buttons," she said.

Go'el clambered into the seat, and found his hands hovering nervously as he avoided touching anything. He could see down the long sights of the gun, which were a bit like a spyglass, but rather than buttons, there were various levers: to turn the gun left or right, up or down, and then a kind of clutch to squeeze in order to fire. Avery explained their functions as she pointed out each one.

Though he could not see any buttons, Go'el was very careful not to touch anything, just in case there really were any. His fingers were clenched on the seat edge instead, and he asked about the biggest thing the Outriggers had killed in this ship. Avery was more than pleased to launch into a long story about a large, tentacled monstrosity.

Go'el was so taken with Avery's storytelling--and the very illustrative pantomime she was employing to bring the fight against the monster to life--that he did not even notice the ship pull out of dock.

 

* * *

 

The closest thing Go'el had experienced to sailing was rowing out with Eyla in a boat, and he was learning that it was not at all comparable to sailing aboard a genuine ship. It was an unfortunate side effect of his sheltered upbringing that he had experienced far less of the sea than he knew about in theory. Most Kul Tiran children were taken out at sea early and often so they would find their sea legs, even if the rest of their life was meant for a landlocked line of work.

He could not begrudge Eyla the fact that his education had lapses compared to Kul Tiran children, because he was achingly aware that he was not Kul Tiran as such. But as the _Stormdodger_ skimmed gracefully across the waves, he could not help but regret all the shortcomings of his upbringing.

Even after Avery and Kimberley left him for other duties, and the harpoon gun had become less interesting, Go'el lingered at the bow, looking out over the sea and feeling the swiftness of their passage as a cold wind whipped against his face and through his hair. It would not take long at all for the ship to reach the northern-most tip of Kul Tiras, where the Shrine was located. He planned to enjoy the trip to the very last moment.

Eyla had come to check on him at one point, standing with him for a few minutes; but any conversation between them was lost to the wind, and eventually, she ruffled his hair and went off to sort out her own tasks, content that he was staying out of trouble.

Here, at the bow of the Stormdodger, Go'el thought maybe he could understand a bit of what Eyla had said--that the sea inspired yearning. The air was a physical presence against him, something cold and salty pressing against him with a force that might knock him over if he did not root himself into place firmly.

If he listened closely, the constant rush of the water parting against the hull of the ship and the shriek of the wind might be more than just sounds. Not quite words, a language unto itself.

But Go'el never discovered if that language would resolve itself into something comprehensible, because with a resounding thud, the ship shuddered so violently under Go'el's feet that he was thrown to the deck.

By the time he rolled himself over and jumped back upright, it was to see a scaled, water-slick hand reach over the railing, and then another, carrying a trident.

"Naga!" rose the alarm from every quarter. "We're being boarded!"

 

* * *

 

The naga were something Go'el had only heard about in stories, and even then, from the most crazed of sailors. The tales of the merciless myrmidons who cut into flesh with their tridents, or the seawitches who could wield magic as strong as any tidesage, and twice as cruelly. Of all the monsters of the sea, they were a relatively infrequent danger. Now, having to face that danger in truth, Go'el found himself desperately wishing he had gotten at least some hypothetical instructions for how to handle such creatures.

The myrmidon who hefted himself over the railing closest to Go'el dropped to the deck with a wet squelch, and then eyed Go'el like he was a tiny, unexpected snack set out just for him. The smile the myrmidon gave was nasty, and the way his head fins flared in interest made Go'el's heart drop to his knees.

But far from letting himself be skewered like deep-fried octopus at the market, Go'el scrambled to the nearest weapon he could find--a harpoon from the ammo cache of the nearby harpoon gun. He hefted it even as the naga's smile shaded into mocking. The harpoon was sharp, and Go'el had no compunction against defending himself.

So Go'el squared his shoulders and snarled at the naga, stomping his feet in some attempt--however feeble--to seem more intimidating. The naga was not impressed, and with a snort, he whipped his trident in an arc, hooking the harpoon and wrenching it out of Go'el's hands, sending it flying overboard and disappearing into the waves with a plop.

Go'el's jaw hung open, partly surprised, partly angered, and yet now fully convinced that he was going to be cut to pieces.

He cast his gaze about, looking for any escape or any weapon, but when he shifted his weight this way or that, the naga moved quickly to block any attempt at escape. Rows of sharp, reptilian teeth grinned at Go'el and his mounting distress. The myrmidon raised his trident, which gleamed like an immutable sentence in the sun.

And, in the moment it took Go'el to conclude he was going to die, the myrmidon's smile twisted sharply--and a cutlass cut a red slice into the myrmidon's side, spraying blood.

The myrmidon screeched, or growled, or however one might describe the terrible, wailing death-rattle he made, but the cutlass came again and again, before he could twist around and make use of his trident. When the blade chopped through his arm, the weapon clattered to the ground, and then the myrmidon followed with a slash across his neck, drenching the deck in blood.

Go'el looked up to see Kimberley Eastwind, who flicked blood off her cutlass almost contemptuously. Her face was a mask of implacability, at odds with her gentle expression from before, but when her eyes fell to Go'el, something softened behind them.

"Hide," Kimberley advised, gestured towards the stairs going below-deck.

There were still bloodied fighters locked in combat all across the deck, and while Kimberley had made seafood of the naga menacing Go'el, other sailors were not as triumphant, and their bodies littered the deck, bleeding or already dead.

Go'el did not look too closely, but he nodded to Kimberley, and dashed away just as another myrmidon attempted to get the drop on her. Go'el did not look behind as he heard the clash of metal against metal, and Kimberley's muffled curses. He looked ahead, to the dark square of the entrance that Kimberley had pointed him to. He did not look down, or around, either, seeing nothing but what he could glimpse from the corner of his eyes, and even that too much.

He weaved between obstacles, quickly quickly, and he was only steps away from safety when he heard it.

"To the Abyss with you!" one of the naga hissed.

"To the Abyss with me?" came the incredulous response, laden with so much indignation. "To the Abyss with you!"

Go'el's head whipped around involuntarily, because he recognized the voice. How could he not? 

It was Eyla, with lightning arching between one palm and the head of her staff. She was caught between one myrmidon, and a sleeker naga with a multitude of arms--a seawitch, by the glow of magic around her fingers.

Eyla ducked under a swing of the trident and released the lightning, which jumped between seawitch and myrmidon, wracking their bodies and ripping shrieks of rage from them. If she'd had one opponent, Eyla would have probably taken them down by now, but having to jump away from the myrmidon's weapon, and then block the seawitch's spell, Eyla had barely enough time to drag out the fight into a prolonged stalemate.

As Eyla froze the myrmidon's tail to the deck, she had to dodge a bolt of boiling water from the seawitch--but by the time she had her own spell at her fingertips, the myrmidon had crushed the ice pinning him in place with the butt of his trident, and taken another swipe at Eyla.

Go'el had skidded to a halt to watch breathlessly as Eyla punched the seawitch straight in the face to stagger her for a moment. All she needed was a moment to catch get the upper hand, he was sure.

At Go'el's feet, a sailor had died with a cutlass still clenched in his hand, and a knife still on his belt. Mistrusting himself with a blade as large as a cutlass, Go'el snatched the knife, which was perhaps something used to clean fish, more than something to fight with.

It made scarce difference to Go'el. He unsheathed it and loped across the deck. Blood rose to his head, and the sounds of fighting and dying around him were subsumed into a rush of meaningless sound as he ran straight for the myrmidon. Go'el struck the blade into the myrmidon's tail, and pushed down until the knife was sunken to the hilt. There was a visceral satisfaction to it.

The myrmidon bellowed, and failed to avoid a bolt of water from Eyla hitting him straight in the face. His head snapped back, and his tail lashed hard, striking Go'el violently enough to flatten him to the deck.

Go'el missed what happened next--the rush of sounds in his ears popped back into reality, and he looked to see the seawitch impaled on ice, and the myrmidon convulsing on the deck. Eyla brought her staff to bear and smashed the myrmidon's face.

Go'el still felt dazed, and he wasn't sure if he briefly lost conscience, but in the next moment, Eyla's face was over him. There was blood streaking down one side of her face. Her eyes glowed like the lining of thunderclouds clouds in a storm.

"Hold your breath," she said. 

He obeyed, though he felt breathless. Eyla pressed a hand against him, pinning him to the deck. He didn't understand why, at first, because he had made no move to get up, but he put it together as Eyla released a spell, and a wave of water rose from one side of the ship and crashed over the deck, sweeping over it like the sea's judgment.

It felt like it was an eternity that Go'el was submerged in it--the water was almost warm, almost friendly. But he couldn't breathe, and it was heavy, and his lungs burned.

When it passed, every naga had been washed off the deck, and a few corpses with them. Eyla slumped down to her elbow, and they both coughed and panted miserably for a few minutes.

The wave had tilted the tide of battle, as it were. The naga attempting to climb back on board no longer had the element of surprise, and so they were slaughtered before finding purchase again.

Go'el turned to the side, feeling like he ought to be coughing out seawater, though nothing came out, and after a few minutes of dry-heaving, he put his cheek against the deck, and tried to catch his breath instead. Around them, the fighting was dying down.

 

* * *

 

The naga attack was repelled, and the decks were cleaned. The tidesages took on the task of handling the dead and putting the spirits to rest. Eyla kept Go'el close in the aftermath, and Go'el was now hesitant to leave her hip as well. 

The attack had left him a bit jittery, but he still recalled the way rage had ballooned inside him in the moments before he went at the myrmidon with the knife, and far from feeling scared, he felt irrationally protective of Eyla, and convinced that he ought to be there always to tackle her enemies.

The crew seemed especially shaken by the attack. A few sailors had died, though none of the Outriggers had. This might have caused tension between the groups, but for the captain turning the brunt of his rage against the tidesages on board.

"A whole damn coterie of you lot," the captain had yelled in Galespeaker Heron's face, "and the blasted naga still snuck up on us! Couldn't a single fucking one of you read _that_ on the tides?"

The Galespeaker withstood the screaming with great poise. He was an older man, wizened and scarred like the saltiest old sea dog Kul Tiras could offer, and he was hardly going to shrink in the face of some yelling. But he cut the captain down with a single glare.

"We're hardly the only ones with mastery of the seas," Galespeaker Heron said in an even voice, "and the naga are a new danger, whose magics are still strange to us. Know that we have learned enough from their tricks to make them fear us next time, and remember the Tidemother's favor is never guaranteed."

The captain paled under that mildly delivered scolding, and mumbled something before scrambling out of sight, and letting the tidesages to finish preparations for the dead.

Go'el wandered only far enough away from Eyla's hip to bump into Avery and Kimberley again in the hall. He thanked Kimberley for her help during the raid, belated though his gratitude was.

Kimberley smiled in response, and leaned down to hand Go'el a dagger in a scuffed old leather sheath.

Go'el took the dagger, but then looked up at her in confusion.

"Sea's dangerous," Avery said. "You're about old enough to learn how to defend yourself, aren't you?"

"Y-yes," Go'el agreed numbly. 

"We can show you a few tricks," Kimberley said.

Before Go'el could eagerly accept, both Avery and Kimberley looked up over his shoulder, and he turned around to see Eyla standing in the shadow of the nearby doorway. Her hair was disheveled, and though she had cleaned her face and healed herself, there was still some dry blood encrusted behind her nostril. In the semi-obscurity of the hall, with Eyla backlit by a lamp in the room behind her, there were dark circles around her eyes.

Go'el didn't know if Eyla would approve, but something about the bone-deep exhaustion etched into her posture made that newfound protectiveness flare up in his chest again.

"Thank you," he said to the two women, as he gripped the dagger to his chest and nodded. "If... if you want to teach me, then I want to learn."

Avery didn't smile visibly, though there was something around her eyes that made it look as though she was only hiding it. Kimberley merely looked sad as she nodded in reply.

 

* * *

 

Even with the unexpected interlude, it only took one more day to reach the Shrine of the Storm. 

There was some amount of ceremony to the event--they had Galecaller Heron with them, after all, and he was on the Council of Tidesages, making his return from the Monastery at least a bit noteworthy.

But Go'el took it all in distractedly, regretting the fact that he had not had more time to learn from Avery and Kimberley. They'd promised to drop in at the Monastery and show him more tricks, but he knew how uncertain such promises could be, coming from people who lived such dangerous lives as the Outriggers.

Eyla had him dress in his finest clothing before leaving the ship, and then she had handed Go'el a large, heavy flask, and instructed him to hide it down his shirt.

"It's for Old Man Stormsong," she said, and Go'el wondered if she was allowed to call him that. Everyone else called him Greatfather Stomsong, and the fact that Eyla didn't use that moniker in anyone else's earshot made Go'el suspect this was something he shouldn't repeat.

Once they got past the tidewater bridge and reached the island of the Shrine proper, the group of tidesages was met by the honorary complement of tideguards. At their head was none other than Lord Stormsong in full ceremonial garb. 

Unlike Greatfather Stormsong, who was a figure more legend than man in the imagination of most Kul Tirans and even most tidesages, his youngest son, the current Lord Stormsong, had an approachable air about him. Go'el had met Lord Stormsong at the Monastery, as it was not unusual for Lord Stormsong to stay there whenever he had business in Boralus, but circumstances had never necessitated for Go'el to interact with the man for any extended period of time. 

Lord Stormsong greeted Galecaller Heron first, his voice gentle yet sonorous, and the Galecaller bowed in return, showing all due deference. The other tidesages greeted Lord Stormsong next, and he acknowledged them warmly, welcoming them back to the Shrine.

Go'el was near the back of the group, but Lord Stormsong's eyes fell on him eventually.

"Young Go'el," Lord Stormsong said evenly, and Go'el bowed in response. "Sister Eyla's request has been granted, and my father will receive you in audience. Tideguard Merran will see you there. Currents guide you."

Go'el bowed again, a bit awkwardly as the weight of the flask shifted inside his shirt, and then snapped back up suddenly, hoping there was no sound of sloshing liquid to reveal him. He thought he saw a smile at the corner of Lord Stormsong's mouth before he turned away, though.

One of the tideguards peeled away from the group--this was Merran, then--and stood before Go'el, giving him a look up and down, before grunting for the orc to follow.

The tidesages went one way, and the tideguard led Go'el the other, taking an almost hidden path that sloped downwards, winding back around to the beach. The tideguard did not speak, and Go'el kept silent in turn, but that only made made Go'el's tension mount with each step.

When they reached the entrance to Greatfather Stormsong's Sanctum, it looked like yet another cavern. Shallow seawater crept all the way to the entrance and into the darkness. The tideguard continued to hold his silence, but he posted himself by the cavern, and the implication was clear that Go'el was to continue inside on his own.

Swallowing back his misgivings, Go'el splashed up to the cavern--making a ruin of his carefully polished boots--and passed the dark threshold to find solid, dry stone again. His boots squelched loudly in the darkness, but there was light ahead and around a corner.

He walked with certainty, knowing that any hesitation would be heard in the echo of his footsteps, and turned the corner not knowing what he ought to be expecting.

What Go'el found was a a disarmingly domestic setting. 

There was a rug on the floor, and where it was not water-stained it was a green the color of seaweed rotting on the beach. The lamp hanging on the ceiling--so high up that Go'el wondered who was tall enough to reach and turn it on--shed light in such a way that only the rug was properly illuminated. To the far side, opposite the entrance, was a pool of water, black and probably very deep, if not very wide. Along the walls, in diffuse half-shadows, Go'el could see furniture: a desk, a bookshelf, a chair that seemed to have some clutter in it, until Go'el realized it was actually someone sitting.

Go'el froze at the very edge of the rug, just far enough within the circle of lamplight that he was blinded by it, but also just far enough inside that he could not see into the shadows clearly.

Everything in the room seemed oversized to him, even more than could be accounted for by the fact that he was only still a child, and Kul Tirans tended to build their furniture large and sturdy.

The thing that Go'el had assumed was clutter moved, leaned forward, bent lower towards him. The gnarled visage of an old man came into view, a white beard tangled with netting and seashells and bells, one eye a milky white and the other a deep, dark blue under the heavy, drooping lid.

For a heart-stopping moment, Go'el thought he was faced with a sea giant, and not a human. It was not merely the size of him, which was indeed larger than Go'el even knew humans could grow, but something about the old man gave off the impression of some immense power just barely held in check. 

Perhaps not a giant, precisely, but Go'el had heard stories of the vry'kul in Northrend, and perhaps that was closer to the truth. Now that Go'el's fluttering heart had a moment to calm itself, perhaps the man before him was not so large as the stories about vry'kul either, though... certainly closer in size to them than to humans.

"Ah... a visitor," Greatfather Stormsong spoke slowly, ponderously, as he looked over Go'el. "You have grown since last you came here, little one."

"I... don't remember that," Go'el admitted. Eyla had told him he had been brought to the Shrine once before, as a babe, in order to petition Lord Stormsong for adoption. It hadn't occurred to Go'el that he might have been brought before Greatfather Stormsong as well.

"You were only a babe," Greatfather Stormsong grunted in confirmation.

He leaned back; Go'el's eyes adjusted to the lighting enough that he could now take in the rest of Greatfather Stormsong's appearance. His bare feet were just as gnarled as the rest of him. The hem of his robes was tattered, but even when the robes had been new, Go'el guessed they had been of plain, sturdy material, and not fine silk as befit nobles.

Go'el knew in his heart that Greatfather Stormsong was more than a mere nobleman, however. Something about his presence felt heavy. In Go'el's fevered imagination, a similarity was drawn between the abyssal monsters that grew to leviathan proportions and this powerful creature before him--they were equally gigantic to a child who had not seen enough of the world to draw other comparisons. Unstoppable and incomprehensible, risen from the depths to deliver the cold, dispassionate judgment of the seas.

"Come closer, Go'el," Greatfather Stormsong groused. "I don't bite." This last word turned into a slow smile, lips peeling back to reveal rows of sharp shark-like teeth, as if to belie the promise as soon as it was made.

It was perhaps meant to scare Go'el, and undoubtedly Go'el was scared, but in his young chest a fire ignited, less bravery and more a spiteful contrariness. If the old man expected him to be cowed, then that only made Go'el wish to prove him wrong, so he stepped forward, into the lamplight and closer to Greatfather Stormsong's chair.

Greatfather Stormsong hummed in approval, and regarded Go'el for a moment.

"Why are you here?" he asked.

"...I don't know," Go'el admitted, because Eyla had not explained this to him. Perhaps it was meant to be self-evident, either to Go'el or to Greatfather Stormsong, what this visit was about. 

If Greatfather Stormsong was disappointed by this answer, he did not show it.

"Eyla gave you something for me?" he asked instead.

Go'el blinked, and nodded, reaching into his shirt to pull out the flask Eyla had hastily told him to hide there. He walked yet closer to Greatfather Stormsong, and extended the flask to him.

The old man bent to take it. The chair creaked as it suffered the shift in weight, and joints popped in counterpoint. In his hand, the large flask, which had felt huge and unwieldy inside Go'el's shirt, was rendered small by comparison. He plucked it from Go'el's fingers easily, and uncapped it to take a swig.

Go'el wasstartled by the satisfied sigh that hissed through Greatfather Stormsong's teeth.

"Black rum," Greatfather Stormsong said appreciatively. "The good stuff. My children don't like me drinking," he imparted with a sardonic smile, "on account of my advanced age and ailing health."

Go'el wondered if he was going to get in trouble, then, and became alarmed that Eyla might have done something forbidden.

As if sensing his thoughts, Greatfather Stormsong waved a hand dismissively.

"I have been old for a very long time, child," he said. "So old..." He shook his head. "I will return to the sea soon. The Tidemother's embrace grows more tempting by the day."

"I'm sorry," Go'el said, uncertain of what else he could say to that.

"Do not be. I will be welcome to the waves when I decide to go. And Kul Tiras will go on without me. It is a powerful nation that my tidesages have helped to build, and I trust them to keep it so, long after I have gone." He took another slow sip from the flask. "Now you, young boy..." 

"I want to be a tidesage as well," Go'el said quickly, and then shied back, wondering if he was being too bold. 

"Ah... you want to learn to listen," Greatfather Stormsong surmised. 

"Do you think I can?" Go'el asked. "I mean..."

"Because you're an orc?"

Go'el nodded, and his gaze fell to the floor. Salt had dried on his boots, marring the black leather.

"I shouldn't think it matters, or at least not in the sense you think," Greatfather Stormsong said. "There were no humans who could hear the whispers until I heard them. Until I taught everyone else. Knowing something is possible can make a difference, I grant you. Not knowing something is impossible makes a difference as well. In your case..."

Greatfather Stormsong lapsed into silence for a few long minutes. Perhaps he was thinking, though the tilt of his head was more like listening, but Go'el held his tongue regardless, waiting for the verdict.

"You may not become a tidesage in the end," Greatfather Stormsong said after a prolonged silence, "but you have much to learn that will help you become what you must."

"Oh..."

"Do not be disappointed, little one," Greatfather Stormsong said. "A tidesage is a thing of Kul Tiras, and you will travel far beyond these shores one day. Your people have no word for tidesage, but they will have a word for you nonetheless."

"The orcs?" Go'el asked. "They're not my people."

Greatfather Stormsong laughed then, a dry, rusty sound that resounded against the walls of the cave.

"You will return to them like a river to the ocean," Greatfather Stormsong said. "Perhaps not all of them are your people yet, but you will find them. The winds will tell. And if you do not take pride in them now, when they are broken and scattered, then you must forge them into something that you can take pride in. The future... is a strange place. But one cannot love the sea without loving the strangeness as well."

Go'el did not understand, but neither was he inclined to argue. He gave a tight nod instead, committing the words to memory.

"Now, I am afraid I have nothing more to give," Greatfather Stormsong said apologetically, then interrupted himself, as if suddenly recalling something. "Ah, wait. In fact I believe I do have something." He reached into his beard, and slowly untangled one of the shells braided into it. He presented it to Go'el, a speckled cream-and-brown cowry shell, big enough to fill Go'el's palm.

"Is it magical?" Go'el asked, because he could not think of any other reason he was being presented with such a gift.

"It is a shell. Children like shells, don't you?" Greatfather Stormsong asked.

"A tortollan showed me a seashell that sings, once," Go'el said.

"This one does not sing," Greatfather Stormsong said.

"...It's very pretty," Go'el admitted.

"Yes, it is," Greatfather Stormsong agreed. "Now, best go back to Eyla."

Go'el took the dismissal for what it was, and bowed before turning to walk away.

Tideguard Merren was waiting outside, and gave Go'el a once-over as he emerged from the cavern.

"Didn't give the flask back, did he?" the tideguard asked, and Go'el flushed deep green as he realized his smuggling had not gone unnoticed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter wanders over into heavily headcanon territory, but it's already an AU, so headcanons just grease the wheels, so to say.
> 
> The fact that the Naga only started showing up in number after the Third War sounded hinky to me, because in 10000 years I have a hard time believing they'd just sit on their butts and be bored in their city under the sea.
> 
> But then there's the fact that lore kind of implies someone in the Stormsong family must have lived for millenia to make it simultaneously true that Lord Stormsong's father brought people to Stormsong valley, AND that the original Stormsong who found Kul Tiras was awarded the valley that bears his name in thanks for leading them there. Because elsewhere the lore says Kul Tiras was found almost three thousand years ago, so that's some truly batshit timeline stuff happening there. So, alright, okay. Greatfather Stormsong is a wicked powerful tidesage and lived for thousands of years. Plothole plugged.
> 
> Also, heee-eey, guess who's showing up next chapter (it's Jaina). Because what's the point of setting this in Kul Tiras if Jaina doesn't show up.


	4. The Pride of Kul Tiras

When Go'el met Jaina for the first time, it was at the Sanctum of the Sages, in Boralus Harbor.

He was still young enough that he did not tower over most humans, and if he pulled his hood over his head and walked close to the tidesages, nobody would give him too close a look. And traveling outside the Monastery was still novel enough for him that he would do nothing to risk losing the privilege.

He arrived that day with Eyla at the Sanctum door only to find it guarded by a couple more Proudmoore house guards than either of them expected.

"Young Lady Jaina has dropped in for a visit," Tideguard Allerdyce informed them with a bemused expression, and then further imparted in an undertone, "Badgering Yvia for lessons. Again."

Eyla made a hum of acquiescence, not sounding particularly surprised, but Go'el had to resist the urge to tug on his hood tighter. If he raised his hands now and let the sleeves slip back, it would only draw attention to just how green his skin was. As it was, when Eyla ushered him through the door, one of the Proudmoore turned his head to give Go'el, so suddenly that they were both startled.

But the Sanctum was busy as always. Rows of desks were arranged for the tidemappers and arcanists to ply their skills. Scrolls were pinned to the walls, filled with lists and incantations and recipes and spells and notes-to-self. Paper and writing implements were scattered all around, and books were stacked along the walls where they overflowed from the too-few bookshelves. Some desks were also filled with books, but others instead had tomes gently floating a few inches in the air over the wooden surfaces, humming with magical potency that gave the air in the room a certain buzzing static quality. Towards the other side of the room, desks had been cleared to create a space where magic could be tested out.

Among the dozen or so tidesages busily working around the room, Jaina was easy to spot, if only because she was not robed as they were. Instead she was in a bright blue dress, and a white blouse with ink stains along the sleeves. She was a lanky girl, in that awkward stage of adolescence when humans were all knees and elbows, shooting up in height year by year.

She was kneeling up on a cushioned seat so she could read the book some tidesage had forgotten open on the desk. Go'el didn't think anyone had allowed her to read that particular tome, and that thought was confirmed as the book rattled on the desktop, and its pages turned rapidly as if blown by unseen winds, until it finally slammed closed of its own accord. Jaina sneezed at the small cloud of dust blown into her face,  but, not remotely abashed by her own nosiness, she gave the book an indignant glare, as if it was the one in the wrong.

"Young lady, what have I said about poking your nose where it doesn't belong?" one of the older tidesages asked, clucking her tongue at the girl.

"That eventually something's going to bite it off," Jaina grumbled, quoting what had perhaps been the tidesage's precise words. "But see, if you just gave me permission to read the books, that wouldn't be a problem!"

Go'el couldn't help the small snort of laughter that escaped him, though that drew the girl's attention to him. Her blue eyes hooked into him like harpoons, and for a beat, they merely looked at each other, surprised by the mere fact that the other was in the room. 

Jaina's eyes narrowed thoughtfully as she took in Go'el, and in turn Go'el felt his jaw set in a stubborn expression he'd probably gotten from Eyla, intent on insisting without words that he, unlike Jaina, actually belonged there in the Sanctum.

The staring contest was cut off by Eyla noticing the young Lady Jaina and making a surprised sound.

"Dearie, you have a bit of something on your face," Eyla said, and leaned over to brush a thumb over the speck of ink on Jaina's cheek. But Eyla only managed to smear the tiny droplet into a large smudge, made worse the more she persisted. "Er... best wash your face later," Eyla said, retracting her hand and wiping her fingers against her robes.

Yvia appeared at that point, thankfully, managing to save both Eyla and Go'el from their social fumbling.

"Lady Jaina," Yvia said, looking absolutely forbidding, "we have already said we will set up lessons at your father's convenience, and have them at the Keep." In quick motions, Yvia produced a handkerchief and a vial from her belt pouch, and after pouring a few drops of the contents onto her handkerchief began vigorously scrubbing Jaina's cheek.

"But I can start now!" Jaina insisted, wincing a little at Yvia's ministrations. She was not a woman known to have a gentle hand. "Won't I know more the sooner I start?"

"You're already going to be starting plenty early for a mage," Yvia replied, and inspected Jaina's cheek--a bit red, but scrubbed clean of ink.

"He's allowed to be here," Jaina said petulantly, her eyes sliding to Go'el.

Go'el stiffened, and even Eyla's shoulders rose up defensively. The tidesages around them did not pause in their work, though the way they carefully avoided looking in certain directions was telling all on its own.

Yvia gave Jaina a completely unimpressed look.

"That is House Stormsong's matter," Yvia replied bluntly, "and has no relevance on your situation."

Jaina worked her jaw soundlessly, as she considered and visibly discarded a series of replies, but then a pink blush rose to her cheeks.

"Sorry," Jaina muttered, her lips pursing together as she looked away.

"You should return to the Keep," Yvia said, her tone brooking no argument. "I am certain someone is missing you."

Unhappy to be dismissed, Jaina yet left the Sanctum, albeit dragging her feet. She threw a final, forlorn look over her shoulder, eyes sweeping across the room with a longing that almost made Go'el feel sorry for her, but then she disappeared through the door, and he put her out of his mind.

 

* * *

 

After the first time, it seemed Go'el was going to keep running into Jaina Proudmoore, through entirely no fault of his own.

It was a day for petitions at the Stormsong Monastery, in which people came for blessings, or healing, or simple advice from the tidesages. Go'el felt secure enough in his Initiate's robes to navigate the crowd, and experienced enough in the flow of traffic at the Monastery to know when it was safe for him to be among the visitors.

Strictly speaking, he had no business there, and therefore no real reason to be walking around, but he could never quite resist his curiosity. He paused to see a small contingent of vulpera sailors in deep talks to one of the tidesages, but he was drawn away from trying to not-eavesdrop-but-accidentally-overhear by a sniffling sound not far off.

He noticed the children almost immediately. They were not moored to the shadow of any adult, instead taking shelter under the climbing vines that crept up along one of the Monastery walls. Small enough to be overlooked in the bustle, but the way they clung to that particular corner, Go'el suspected that they had stashed themselves there deliberately. It was one of the places Go'el had often chosen when he'd been younger and smaller.

But the children, one larger, and crouched in the grass, and one smaller and sitting down huddled against the wall, were small enough that Go'el was certain they would be missed. The younger had a trail of tears running down his face, but seemed not to be crying anymore so much as resigned to misery. The elder child was perfectly calm, and holding the younger's hand with an air of brotherly responsibility.

"There's no point crying over it now," the elder was saying, "your tideskipper will be home when we get back. It's just a toy, anyway."

"But I want it _now_ ," the younger whimpered. He had a soft knit hat shaped like a squid, with tentacles meant to tie under the chin, but instead he fiddled with the ends of the ties, worrying at the wool, seeking the comfort of a toy that he was missing.

The elder gave a sullen shrug at this, not knowing how to help.

Go'el did not linger near the children long, passing just closely enough to hear the exchange, and then steering off to take the path deeper into the Monastery, and off to the pool in the back, where Initiates were still at their lessons even on a market day.

Brother Pike was watching over the learners, not holding a lesson but merely supervising in case of some mishap. He stood with his arms clasped behind his back, his expression pensive until it fell on Go'el, at which point he raised an eyebrow in question.

Go'el explained his purpose there, and Brother Pike's other eyebrow went up as well, before a smile broke across his face, and he waved Go'el on.

When Go'el approached the children again--still crouched in their little nook--he had a small water elemental cradled in his hand; a droplet. The droplets often formed around the practice pools, run-off from the elemental magics that the Initiates were always practicing, and they were gentle things, oozing around people's ankles like friendly slugs whenever the tides were high and magic was thick in the air.

The children looked to Go'el's face first, something like curiosity and a shade of fright in their eyes, but then down to his hands, to the droplet.

"Hello," Go'el greeted, putting on his friendliest mien, "would you like to hold this?" He tilted his chin towards the elemental. "It might cheer you up."

The elder child seemed wholly unconvinced, but the younger one, with amazement blooming over his face, extended his arms. Carefully, Go'el maneuvered the droplet, easing it into the young boy's lap. It wobbled, like a drop of water, but held together as the child's hands rested against its skin.

"It's soft!" the boy remarked in surprise, and pushed against the surface of the droplet like it was testing resistance. When he turned his palms over, they were not wet.

The elder child gave the droplet a more skeptical poke. The droplet groped up into the air following the sensation, somehow demonstrating curiosity despite its lack of face.

Go'el's gift seemed to go over well, because the younger boy giggled and pushed his face against the droplet's surface, and then looked up to Go'el.

"Thank you, mister!" the boy said.

Go'el laughed awkwardly at that--he certainly wasn't old enough to be called 'mister'--but then shrugged off the thanks. He didn't think he had done much at all.

"Could we take it home with us?" the elder boy asked, giving the droplet a speculative look.

"Oh--" Go'el tilted his head, thinking it over, "I think maybe it would lose cohesion if it was taken from the Monastery grounds. It's not a very strong elemental."

The children blinked in response, clearly not quite understanding.

"I think it would just pop," Go'el explained more simply.

The younger child gasped, his expression shocked and a bit concerned. He rose to his feet, picking up the droplet in his arms as he did, and walked over to Go'el to hand it back, pouring it into the orc's arms as Go'el accepted back the gift, baffled.

"It's okay, you should keep it," the boy said very seriously, before turning to his brother and taking his hand. "I want Father, let's go find him."

The two children turned to walk away, but the younger looked over his shoulder one last time, giving a tiny wave before being pulled away by his brother.

Go'el stood in place for a bit, still crouched with the droplet in his arms, mulling over the encounter, before grunting to himself and rising to leave.

Furtive motion in the corner of his eye drew his attention however, and he sighed as he let the droplet slip to the ground. It began shuffling through the grass right away, oozing over Go'el's foot as it did. He gently pushed it away, considering his course of action, before deciding to be as direct as the situation allowed him to be.

He walked towards where he'd seen that flash of blond hair in his peripheral vision, which meant he slipped past pillars and between looming bookshelves to a corner of the small library, where he found her hunched among the books as if bad posture could camouflage her.

Jaina Proudmoore wasn't in a dress that day, but in trousers and a brown jacket, a bit too big on her and distinctly not in any Proudmoore colors. She had braided her hair and stuck a cap over it, pulled low over her eyes, but the attempt at subterfuge was undercut by the fact that she was acting too shifty by half. 

Over Jaina's shoulder, Go'el could see Sister Marlin sticking her nose into a book and loudly telegraphing with her body language that none of this was her problem, and she had certainly not seen any Proudmoore scion lurking in the library, no sirree.

"What are you doing here?" Go'el asked bluntly as he rounded on Jaina.

In the background, Sister Marlin turned on her heel and walked as speedily away as she could without bumping into anything--her nose was still in the book, and her ears had also presumably stopped working as long as she was in range to hear Young Lady Jaina getting upbraided by the Monastery foundling.

Jaina scowled, not looking at Go'el but instead at the bookshelf. Her fingers drummed along the book spines like she was very busy trying to find a volume, when in fact her chin was tilted so far up that it seemed she was looking at the shelf above. She was older than Go'el by a handful of years, but being an orc, he still had an inch of height over her, and he used it to loom disapprovingly, like he'd seen Yvia do on occasion.

"Lots of people are here today," Jaina said. "It's market day."

That answered absolutely nothing.

"Should I get someone to help you?" Go'el asked.

He turned away as if going to find someone right at that moment, and Jaina flinched.

"No, wait!" she said, her hand reaching out to grab him, but pulling up short before she touched him, and curling against her side. 

Her eyes were wide, pleading, and Go'el suddenly felt a bit cruel for playing such a trick on her. He was not going to tell on her, when as far as he knew, she had done nothing wrong. Nothing against the Monastery, at least, because he suspected, by the lack of guards, that she'd been sneaking out. But that was her family's transgression to punish, not the tidesages'.

"You're here to learn magic too, aren't you?" she asked.

"I grew up here," he said. "But yes, I'm learning." More than magic, but he suspected Jaina was not interested in the details. She likely had more tutors growing up than he ever did. It was hard for anyone in Kul Tiras to miss how much the Lord-Admiral doted on his only daughter; she had been taught to ride, and sail, and hunt like any proper young lady, and excelled at anything she put her mind to.

Curious that she would get that look of unabashed yearning when it came to magic, then. 

"Have you ever been to the archives?" she asked.

Go'el tried not to groan out loud. Of all the things to sneak around for--

"If you asked permission, I'm sure they'd let you in as well," he said, trying to nip in the bud a request he could see coming and knew very well he should not grant.

Jaina pulled a face, and slumped against the bookshelf behind her, arms crossed. She didn't believe she would be, by her posture, but she didn't elaborate on what she thought the difficulty was. Go'el didn't understand, but neither was he going to sneak her in.

"Do you... want to see the Initiates at their lessons?" Go'el asked.

Jaina's eyes didn't quite light up at the suggestion, but she accepted the offer, nodding slowly.

"I want to be a mage," she clarified, "and study in Dalaran."

"Dalaran," Go'el repeated in wonder. "That's a long way away." For him, it was only a dot on a map, but he had seen illustrations of the majestic towers of the city, and felt a pang of envy that Jaina would see those same towers in truth.

Jaina's lips pursed together, and she nodded again.

"Too far away, as far as Father is concerned," she muttered, revealing now that perhaps there was one thing the Lord-Admiral did deny his daughter.

She shrugged, then, like she was throwing off the heavy thoughts.

"But I'll have to get lessons anyway," she said, turning cheerful again at the prospect, "even if it's just from the tidesages. Do they teach how to summon elementals? I bet I could learn that. Most mages know how to do it as well."

"That's-- rather advanced," Go'el said, and felt a twinge of dread at Jaina's sudden enthusiasm. Still, he gestured her towards the door, and followed in her wake.

"Oh, that's okay if none of the Initiates can do it yet, I'm sure I'll figure it out," Jaina said, doing absolutely nothing to dispel Go'el's second thoughts. He'd intended to distract her so that she wouldn't get in worse trouble, but he was beginning to suspect that was a foolish endeavor.

"We didn't meet properly, by the way, did we?" Jaina said, turning abruptly to offer her hand. "I'm Jaina."

"I know who you are," Go'el pointed out. "Everybody knows who you are."

"Same with you," Jaina huffed, "but that's not the point. We only just met. We're supposed to introduce ourselves."

Funny, he'd thought they'd only just met at the Sanctum, but then, maybe that time didn't count, and hadn't been the best foot to start on anyway.

"Go'el," he said, shaking her hand. She had a firmer grip than he expected, and the grin that split across her face was infectious.

"Nice to meet you!" she said, chipper as anything.

Ah, now that was the face of the girl that nobody could say no to. And even making that observation, Go'el still did not know what he was getting into.


	5. Unfathomable

It was a quiet morning, as brisk and cold as it got during the Kul Tiran summers. The limp light of pre-dawn was steadily giving way to a rosy pink tinge, which crawled across the Stormsong Monastery, gilding its roofs and brightening its courtyards.

Go'el had finished helping the cooks in the kitchen, and was going about his other chores. A few early-bird initiates were milling around the halls and courtyards of the Monastery, stifling yawns and rubbing at their eyes, still unused to the early schedule the tidesages kept. The practice pool was quiescent for now, the water still as it was not being used for any rituals or practice sessions. The rack of candles along the walls had not been lit yet, but that was why Go'el was there.

With careful motions of the burning taper, he began lighting the candles one by one, touching each wick until it caught the flame. There was always something satisfying about this task, though he had at first considered it tedious and boring. And true enough, once he learned how not to catch his own sleeve on fire, it was not precisely a challenging task.

But it had somehow become a soothing one. With his taper, Go'el felt as though he was not merely lighting the candles, but coaxing out the flames from the wick, like drawing out a living thing from its den. Flames were living things, almost, dancing playfully on top of the candles, or otherwise obediently bedding down in their braziers like cats curled up in chairs. The kitchens had fire as well, hungry red blooms that devoured wood and then licked up to prepare the food like they were cooks' familiars.

It was a fanciful line of thought, perhaps. Surely fire was not alive, in the way the sea was, or in the way a storm was, but then, the more he thought about it, the more it occured to Go'el: why wouldn't it be? If he looked long enough into a flame, Go'el thought he could see its living spirit, a capricious thing, sometimes warm and friendly, sometimes devouring and consuming, as changing between one moment and the next as its dance.

'Come now, come out,' Go'el would think as he touched a taper to the next wick, and the fire burst out eagerly. 'It is time to sit at the end of your candle again,' Go'el would think once more, as if he were calling other children out to play. And the fire would appear in a cheerful flicker in response. 

So focused Go'el was on this line of thought, that he did not notice he thought his coaxing entreaties to the fire before he had even touched the burning taper to the next wick--and yet the fire burst out regardless, untouched. It was enough to derail Go'el's meditative mood, as he blinked at the candle uncertainly.

He looked at the rack of candles, from one end to the other, and then glanced around to see if anyone had been close enough to notice what had happened. But the courtyard was quiet, save for the sound of the sea.

Go'el looked back to the candles, and without touching the taper, he focused on a yet unlit one.

'Come out, please,' he thought, cautious and hopeful. 'Come burn this wick and melt this wax for the day.'

This time the flame appeared slowly, building from a pinprick of an ember until it flared into a proper flame at the end of the candle.

'Did you come because I called?' wondered Go'el.

' _I came because it is my purpose to burn_ ,' the tiny flame replied in a voice that was not sound, ' _and your call drew me to where I might do that which is my purpose_.'

'Is this magic?' Go'el wondered.

' _It is the way of things. It is the path set before you. It is the kiln in which you will be forged_.'

'I don't understand.'

' _Understand only that it is fire's purpose to burn. It requires nothing else of you_.'

Go'el blinked, as he realized he had been staring into the flame long enough for its light to have formed spots in his vision. He rubbed at his eyes.

He nearly jumped out of his skin when a hand settled on his shoulder, and he looked up to find Brother Pike's gentle face peering down at him.

"Good morning, Go'el," Brother Pike said.

"Good morning, Brother Pike," Go'el replied a bit hastily, as though nervous about being caught at something. He was not sure at what, though. Perhaps shirking at his chores.

"Do you know why we have these?" Brother Pike asked, gesturing to the candles.

"For meditation?" Go'el hazarded a guess.

"Ah," Brother Pike's eyes lit up the way they did when an initiate gave an unexpectedly insightful answer. "Indeed. But do you understand why we hold with fire in a place that is meant to teach the ways of water and wind?"

Go'el shook his head.

"As tidesages--as Kul Tirans--we always look to the sea. To provide for us, to challenge us, to protect us. We mastered the elements that would best help us navigate through this life," Brother Pike said, eyes sparkling at that pun. Go'el did not groan in response, though he was sorely tempted. "But fire... well, fire is also an element. Perhaps not one that we hold in as high importance, but one can't stare into an abyss for too long without eventually longing for the light, and for the warmth again."

"Fire is used for meditation because it's so different from water and wind?" Go'el said, trying to piece together the lesson. Brother Pike preferred it when his students tried to reason things out themselves, rather than being handed the answers, and Go'el had received enough tutoring to have learned this preference.

"Close enough to truth," Brother Pike nodded. "That being said, it is still with water that tidesages find the closest affinity, and that makes us poor flamecallers, I'm afraid. You, however..." 

Go'el nearly flinched again, but covered it up by straightening his shoulders. He did not think he'd done anything bad. Brother Pike regarded him thoughtfully for a few moments, his hands clasped behind his back and his brow furrowed thoughtfully.

"Fire suits you, I think," Brother Pike said eventually. "If you worked at it, I'm sure you'd find it easier to wield than tidesages do."

"Worked at fire?" Go'el said, his voice growing softer as he gave the rack of candles a surprised look. He had never considered--in his envy of tidesages and his desire to emulate them--that he would instead stumble into a skill uniquely his own, separate from theirs. 

"It's not the most safe element to work with," Brother Pike added quickly, "least of all not for a child. But if you are properly supervised, I don't see why not. Certainly you'd want someone to quench the flames if anything went wrong."

"Oh... um, of course," Go'el agreed, though he couldn't quite smother the rise of excitement in his chest. "When can I start, then?"

"Ah, well," Brother Pike grinned at Go'el, and gestured towards the rack of candles, "since you have still not finished lighting all of these, and since I am here to supervise... what do you say we start now?"

 

* * *

 

It was on one of the rare days when Go'el helped the kitchens in the evening, and between the two cooks' apprentices who'd come down with an unfortunate case of poisoning after handling a toxic kind of fish improperly, and the head cook's absolutely foul mood that had everyone scurrying underfoot like frightened bilgerats, it had the makings of an absolutely wretched day.

Go'el had gotten cuffed upside the head for dawdling when he'd spent a few moments too long being mesmerized by a cookfire, and so he had been extra diligent about scrubbing all the pots piled next to him. The two ill apprentices would have been the ones to help him with this task, usually; Go'el liked them well enough, because they were young and liked joking and sometimes they even drew him into their conversations, even though most were on inane subjects that went over Go'el's head. The night before, they'd been ranking the new batch of initiates by how pretty they were; Go'el suspected if any of the initiates heard the conversation, the apprentices would have ended up getting dunked into the sea.

But that night he was not joined by the chatty apprentices, but by the assistant cook, who was as gruff and large as Kul Tirans came, and did not do more than grunt in greeting as he sat down to scrub pots with Go'el. Save for the sound of the pots being cleaned, the entire evening passed in relative quiet. And the assistant cook, who had arms like tree trunks, managed to finish the task quicker than Go'el and the two apprentices put together could have managed. The lack of gossiping while on the task might have had something to do with it.

So Go'el returned to the sleeping quarters exhausted, his head buzzing as he failed to grasp even a thought. It was late, but to his surprise, the light was still on in his and Eyla's room. He eased the door open quietly, wondering if Eyla had fallen asleep while reading again, but no, she was wide awake, sitting at her desk, scribbling in her journal.

He greeted her, perhaps a bit too quietly, because she didn't respond or even seem to notice him. There was something fervent in her motions as she wrote in her journal, and so Go'el assumed she must be absorbed in her work. He tiptoed over to his side of the room, pulling the curtain closed. Thin shards of yellow light pierced along the edges of the curtain, enough for Go'el to change by, and when he slipped into bed, he turned to face the opposite wall. The sound of Eyla's quill scratching paper continued even as he fell asleep.

 

* * *

 

Go'el woke up with foreboding heavy as an anchor in the pit of his stomach. Light still spilled past the curtain edges, the steady flicker of lamplight, but the scratch of Eyla's quill was no more. Perhaps that was what had woken Go'el up, though he could have sworn it had been the sound of a door closing.

He felt too tired for it to be morning yet; his eyes stung with fatigue still, like they did when he woke in the dead of night.

Had Eyla not gone to sleep yet? Why had the light not been put out?

Go'el rose from his bed quietly, and poked his head past the curtain, expecting to see Eyla slumped over her desk, asleep with her cheek resting on her journal, smudging ink everywhere. 

But the room was empty, and Go'el felt a spark of alarm at this.

He emerged past the curtain to look around the room, as if scouring the shadows would turn up Eyla lurking in a corner. In fact it did not, and unsure what else to do, Go'el approached the desk, hoping for some clue.

The journal had been left still open. The quill had not been placed back in its stand, but had been carelessly abandoned on the page, and its tip left a blotch of ink dripping into the paper.

Go'el had thought Eyla was writing something, but it appeared she'd merely been drawing. Two pages full of nothing but tentacles and eyes, or maybe just the one eye, round and pupil blown wide, staring from between the tentacles.

Baffled, Go'el reached over to set the quill aside, and he flipped several pages back. Again, more tentacles, like the ones Eyla would scribble on the edges of pages when she was bored or distracted, except taking up entire pages. Fewer eyes as Go'el went back, but no writing until he reached nearly the beginning of the journal.

Here he found a phrase in Eyla's hand, underlined twice and the quill pressed down so hard on every letter that it nearly cut through the page.

' _Drink deep the shimmering tide._ '

A chill ran down Go'el's back, as though some predator's gaze had swept over him and fixed itself to the back of his head. Suddenly finding the eyes peering at him from the pages too much, Go'el flipped the journal closed, and shuddered.

He was grasped by an unexpected urgency now, and he left the room in search of Eyla, feeling that he desperately needed to find her, even though he was not entirely sure why. He padded out of the room in bare feet--he had not even bothered to pull anything over the threadbare shirt or linen pants he wore to bed--and the stones of the Monastery somehow kept cold even in the heat of summer, sending chills up through his soles. It was uncomfortable; it felt like an ill portent.

Go'el wasn't sure where he was going, but he emerged outside, a hand against the wall as he made his way. He didn't need it because of the darkness--with the two moons out and bright that night, and his orcish eyes better at seeing in the darkness, he could hardly get lost or stumble. But there was something strange about that night, and he liked the reassuring feeling of stone under his palm; a bulwark against rising uncertainty.

He stopped only as he reached the ritual pool in the back courtyard. Eyla was still nowhere in sight. 

The pool was quiet and reflective, shimmering in shards of white and blue moonlight; the sound of the surf beyond the Monastery walls was restless by comparison. Go'el approached the pool, wondering if this was where Eyla would have come. There was a certain draw to the pool. The magic that was practiced in it daily left thick impressions in the air, a potent blanket of static and afterglow that had a distinctly salty taste to it.

Go'el knelt next to the pool and looked into the waters, wishing he could seek guidance in it like the tidesages could. Was the pool connected to the sea? He'd always assumed so, since it was seawater. 

Where was Eyla?

He leaned over the water, and met his reflection in the eye, but did not like how small and uncertain it looked. He thought--well, shouldn't an orc be scarier? stronger? frightening enough to scare away the bad things?

Or what did it matter, when he didn't even know what danger Eyla was in, or if she was even in danger to begin with.

But no, somewhere between his ribs was a brimming certainty that something was wrong.

Where was Eyla? he wondered again.

' _She is here, little brother_ ,' came the answer, sussurating words trickling into his mind like a stream bubbling to the surface.

He leaned closer to the water, listening more closely.

' _She is here_ ,' the words came again, sad and reassuring all at once. This time an image came, distorted like the gently wavering surface of the pool.

Go'el teetered on the edge of the pool only for a fraction of a second more, before he jumped in.

The water was cold, unforgivingly so, and the chill sank into Go'el's muscles instantly, and squeezed all the way down to his lungs. For a moment he was numb, then freezing, but he trusted the water, and despite the ache in his limbs, he swam deeper into the dark tunnel along the pool bottom.

When he emerged, coughing and wheezing, to the pocket of air the tunnel had led him to, Go'el thought he must have emerged to another world as well. The magic that was so thick at the surface of the pool was almost choking down here; or maybe not thicker, so much as of a different quality. The air was musty and dank, and cold in an unnatural sort of way.

There was solid ground, at least, and he waded towards it. Whatever this cavern was, apparently others had also known of it, because an altar had been built on the patch of dry earth it hid.

He found Eyla bent at the foot of the altar, her head bowed as she muttered indistinctly. At first he assumed she was praying, but he couldn't hear the words, and the way she shook her head and shuddered, it looked more like she was having a whispered argument with someone. This was not how she looked when she communed with the sea, or prayed to the Tidemother.

Go'el gave an uneasy look to the altar, which did not have the four-eyed kraken visage of the Tidemother, but a single large eye surrounded by tentacles. He couldn't think of who else the altar might represent, if not the Tidemother, but the singular eye and the disembodied tentacles etched around it put in mind the strange drawings in Eyla's journal, and he did not like it.

He approached Eyla slowly, certain she must hear the wet squelch of his steps, or the water dripping off him and echoing against the cavern walls. But she did not turn around until he spoke.

"Eyla?" he asked uncertainly, and her muttering cut off abruptly.

Eyla stiffened for a moment, like shaken out of a trance, and she looked around herself, before twisting at the waist to turn towards Go'el. Her face was the same as always--perhaps a bit more befuddled than usual--and she did not seem angry about being interrupted from... whatever this was.

"Go'el, you shouldn't be here," she said, and rose to her feet. "Why aren't you in bed?"

"You weren't in the room," Go'el said uncertainly. Now that he was faced with Eyla, and she seemed perfectly fine, he was beginning to doubt the sense of danger that had prodded him into following her.

Eyla tsk'ed, and shook her head.

"Sorry for worrying you, dearie, but we should get you to bed," she insisted, gently ushered him towards the water again. "Look at you, you're soaked."

Go'el threw one last look towards the altar as Eyla ushered him towards the tunnel again. Its singular eye seemed strangely baleful, and once again he had a twinge of doubt that it was the Tidemother the statue was meant to represent.


End file.
